I'm a new member, just joined (well week or so ago), and have until now just been looking through the various Forums and randomly selecting various Topics in them, reading other people's comments/stories about being a gambling addict / compulsive gambler and the responses received. Looking for similar situations I suppose you could say, but also looking at how people use the Forums, trying to understand how they are used, asking questions, wanting a response, just leaving a status, etc.
First comment: Everyone is unique so I have to decide what works for me!!
Maybe a sort of blog, to make me think it all through and understand what I do and why, really more for me to own up, to myself. Using any comments as help and feedback of course. Is it just me or does everyone have difficulty owning up "in public" about their gambling? It's hard to put it down in writing.
Primary Statement: I am a compulsive gambler and I want to stop before it destroys everything I love!!
There!! I have said it, finally admitted it "out loud" so to speak, on the Forum. This is why I am here, now.
Looking for help in how to stop, for good this time, not the "false starts" I done before!! Saying to myself, "you can stop on your own", "you don't need help". Telling my wife that too! And I do stop, for a while, sometimes longer, sometimes shorter, but then I'm at it again, and eventually my wife finds out, !again! and it's not nice (more later as I work through it to myself).
Last time I even went to GA meetings for quite a while, but I did not really find them that helpful. Found it difficult to relate my "style" of addiction to those of the other attendees, sometimes making it hard to use the advice given. But it was a start, made me take a hard look at myself, and they provided a lot of things to do, to try, all good advice. But in the end you (by which I mean me) have to actually use and apply it. That doesn't always work.
But this has got to be it! I love my wife and I do not want to have this between us any more, or lose her because of it. Enough is enough!
Primary Goal: I have GOT to stop!!!
God, this is so hard to put down but I'm sure it's going to help me get it right this time.
I think I will stop now and think about how, where and what to start putting it down, now I've committed to myself to do it, for me.
Hi Bill,
How open and honest have you been to yourself and everyone around you? I see you attended GA meetings but felt they were not helpful. The one thing I have learned since attending is you only get out what you put in. If you go and are totally honest with the group and really engage with the 12 steps you will go a long way to beating this one day at a time. If you go there, tell people what you think they want to hear or just plain lie and ignore the literature then you will get nothing out of it. If you try and beat it alone you are really destined to fail as we need all the support we can get, GA is great for that.
Hi Bill, I have attended GA now for just over 11 years, and it definitely works for me. I gambled for 37 years. If I went into a betting shop and lost a tenner I could come out losing hundreds in one session. My philosophy at the end was the more you put on the more you win . . . as we know that doesn't work. I attended my first GA meeting 12th May 2008 and the penny dropped from day one. I had tried to stop on my own loads of times before with no positive results, I think the longest I ever did was about six months, only to return to gambling and go worse then ever. I got told to take the cotton wool out of my ears and to out it in my mouth, in other words listen and don't talk. To come clean with my partner and to leave no stone unturned, and to give her control of my finances. I did this and even now still don't carry money. I get receipts for everything. She now attends GamAnon and everything works she has been an absolute rock. So my advice is to go back to GA and do things in the GA way and don't try to do this your way. The GA way does work. I wish you all the very best in your recovery - always remember "Just For Today I will not Gamble!"
Hear what you are saying about GA (Joe-90) and you are right, I probably did not commit as much as I should have done although I did try to be honest at the meetings. Worked for a while too.
The problem with it was that most of the people at the meetings were either going to (or had previously used) bookmakers to bet on horses, dogs, football, etc., or online gambling sites via phone or pad to do casino-type betting (roulette, poker, blackjack) or online slots. So often the advice was to get banned from bookmakers and use gamestop (or whatever) to stop online access.
I don't do either of those, (well except for a once a year splurge of a few quid with my wife on the Grand National), I've never had the urge to gamble of horses or football or whatever at the bookies. Never, ever, signed up for any online gambling sites, casinos style or slots or whatever. Never appealed, weird as this may sound.
I do play slot machines (or these days the newer digital equivalents), but only "for real", i.e. hands-on where I actually feed the money in and press the buttons, and only in pubs really, not the ones in the bookies. I did try those in the bookies but like to play with a drink, so usually it's pubs.
That's how I got started!! Down the pub for a beer or two, get the change from a tenner and feed that into the fruit machines, the originally old-style actual spinning reels machines. At first I usually stopped when either the change had gone or I had won a bit and walked away, thinking "next beer for free".
Then I started opening the wallet and putting a note (or two) in directly, not just using the change from a beer, the slippery slope to where I am now. The GA advice was to "stop going to pubs for a drink" and avoid the temptation. Difficult to follow that, as I don't want to try giving up drinking as well, just stop the gambling!
I work away from home during the week, so I'm on my own in an evening and don't really enjoy sitting in my room, on my own, watching TV and drinking on my own. I like the socialising, chatting to people, being out and mingling, having a drink or two down the pub, (but I don't go out to get drunk every night or anything like that, just two or maybe three beers), an "after work" type of thing. My wife is not the same, whilst I'm away she's happy to sit in at home with the TV, on her ipad/phone or reading a book, but she's never really been a "pub" type of person, unless it's out for a meal, although she does have a drink every now and then, so she's not anti-drinking or anything.
Unlike many of the other posts I read on here, and the stories I heard at GA when I was going, I haven't run up loads of debts (luckily). I've generally stayed well within my earnings, but even so my wife sees the money I'm spending on gambling as "wasted" (as it is) and obviously wants to be able to do other things with it, holidays, changes to the house, saving, etc. And rightly she worries all the time that I will get carried away and put us massively in debt, and she doesn't want to live like that, stressed out all the time about our money. I fully understand that, which is why I've committed to her to do this now, get help through Gamcare, maybe find a different GA group to work with (and try harder with it), and STOP GAMBLING!!!
I need to work on understanding the root causes!! I gamble on the slots because I'm down the pub having a drink, I'm down the pub having a drink because I like a beer or two and don't want to be on my own in an evening, etc. This is what I need to work out I think.
Thanks for your advice Dave, I am going to try GA again. Already had a good heart to heart with my wife. She has my bank card and gives me an allowance for the week, which I need as I work away. Still have a credit card which I have to have for whilst I'm away for things like fuel and some shopping, but she checks that all the time to make sure I don't use it for anything else. Did use it one time for cash but got caught, of course - stupid really knowing she would catch it, but your brain doesn't think properly when gambling. Can't do that again!!
And yes, "Just for Today I will not Gamble", 10 days so far and taking it a day at a time.
Thanks for your advice Dave, I am going to try GA again.
Wow Dave
I always knew your insights were golden, it's just the way you were framing them ??
Hi Bill,
Were you able to stop when you'd reached the point you could no longer afford to gamble ?.
Did you chase losses by gambling even more.
Work it out, if the answer to the 1st question is NO
If the answer to the 2nd question is YES
You've come to the right place, no trick questions, just honesty needed.
Best Wishes
AL
Hi AL
To your first question, I never reached that point, or should I say I never got into debt over it but, as my wife points out, I should never "afford it" anyway.
To the second, yes, I sometimes did chase my losses but other times I thought, this isn't going to happen, so I walked away, upset at what I'd lost it's true, but at least I did manage to say enough is enough sometimes.
Now it's always, "enough is enough", I don't want to do this any more! Don't want to put my family through this and risk losing everything!
So I'm here now. Trying to do the right thing.
Hi Bill56
You are certainly doing the right thing by being here, sharing and posting your thoughts. Please remember we are here if you need to talk or struggling. The helpline is open from 8am - midnight, seven days a week. 0808 802 0133. Our advisers are here to help, support and encourage you through your journey.
all the very best
Forum Admin
Doing good today, not gambled for 17 days now, but it's weekdays that are the hardest, not weekends, so I've been working out how to fill the weekday evenings so I don't go back to it next week.
Going to GA on Tuesday, for first time at a new location, hoping I might get on better with this group than at the last one I went to before. Mondays and Thursday is travelling so they're tied up, just Wednesday to sort out now, maybe I'll go to the cinema and watch a film or something, not sure yet.
Tried the Group Chatroom for the first time yesterday, didn't contribute much but interesting to see the various comments and responses. Going on again now for a short while before eating.
Just for today I will not gamble!!
24 days gf!! Managed to not gamble last week, even though weekdays are my worst times. Went to first GA meetings last Tuesday (or should I say first of a new attempt, having been a regular for while before). Used the online chat on Wednesday, filling up my two evenings I am most likely to gamble on. All about keeping occupied with other things even though the thoughts are still there sometimes.
Just for today I will not gamble!!
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